Our Ranch is located in a
scenic area of ND, but when we have lived and worked here all our lives we
sometimes don't take time to stop and appreciate our surroundings. This is
an attempt to share some of the natural beauty as well as the landscaping and
gardening we do.

Wildflowers

The pictures of the flowers
below were taken on some of the virgin prairie on the ranch and were likely here
before man was

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on an image to view a larger photo

I have to
look in a wildflower book to put a name on these blooms...notice how tiny
they are compared to the wristwatch

This is the
ND state flower, the prairie rose with one bud ready to open and rose hips
starting on ripe blooms

Have to
check the book on these tiny flowers too...always have called them bluebells

And the same
for these tiny "daisy" looking flowers

This one I
know, the Purple Coneflower (Echinacea angustifolia)

Wild Lily,
erroneously called a "Tiger Lily"

Also a
Purple Coneflower....the roots have medicinal value (Echinacea) and have
been used by Native Americans for cold remedies, etc.

Some guests
that we took on a wildflower tour...this patch in the prairie is full of
Purple Coneflowers

One of the signs
that spring is really here are these crocuses popping up in the wild prairie

These usually show
up in late March or early April, and their real name is Pasqueflower

Beauty in the
sky....sunrise photographed from front deck

&

Beauty on the
ground....you almost have to click on the photo and enlarge it to appreciate
this rock

And Beauty from the
sky sitting on the ground....acres of snow geese in November

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on an image to view a larger photo

Standing in the exact same place you see the
beauty of this canola field and tree line looking this direction....which
man had a hand in creating

&

by turning 180
degrees to look in the opposite direction you see a ND landmark,
Saddle Butte, 7 miles away across the lake and unlimited Natural Beauty

Home & Garden

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on an image to view a larger photo

This flower bed
was started in 2004 using field rock which is plentiful....the lonely apple
tree will soon have lots of bedding plants for company and will be blooming
a few pictures below

The rock garden
provides a barrier between the parking lot and the garden

Kate from Russia
looking at the bedding plants at Lowe's Gardens in Minot....Ronna and I are
like kids in a candy store when we visit a greenhouse in the spring

The next spring in
2005 we added a rock loop to one side of the rock garden pictured above for
a strawberry patch which Ronna and Marina from Russia are planting here

This shows the
strawberry patch the year it was started as well as the flowers in the main
bed

Another picture of
the strawberry patch/flower bed

A 2006 picture in
the flower part of the same bed

And another 2006
picture...hopefully we can get the clematis to vine around the heart

Notice how thick
the strawberry patch is now complete with a guard to keep the birds out...it
bore fruit from June through the middle of October

A clematis bloom
in the flower bed pictured above

Moss
roses...Arlen's favorite flowers as they grow in tough conditions....in
rocks where there is little soil or moisture

We plant a few
every year but most are from last year's seed which makes it through the
winter

A close up of the
moss roses....these are in the rocks shown below taken Sept 2007

Mums are late
bloomers but hardy....this picture taken October 24, 2007 when most flowers
in ND have succumb to frost

Large field rocks
make a great natural looking wall when landscaping slopes

The 24' X 8' flag
didn't turn out so well this year as the petunias spread out too much and
mixed together...it also was so dry that there wasn't enough water to keep
the lawn green

You don't
appreciate the size of these rocks until you put something by them for
perspective....these benches are 8' wide

More shrubs and
landscaping at the sign in the driveway....Katya, our first girl from
Russia, with Lucky and Snickers

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on an image to view a larger photo

Here are the
blooms on the apple tree by the rock garden....the tree variety is called
"Fireside" and the apple is as fine an eating apple as there is...the tree
was loaded with fruit in the fall with some almost as big as a softball

This apple
tree is in the vegetable garden and it is a cross between a yellow variety
and a delicious...produces a good eating yellow apple but it has never yielded like
the fireside tree

We started a new
raspberry patch in 2004...it produced lots of fruit in 2006 and even more in
2007....raspberry
freezer jam is one of our guest's favorite treats here

You really don't
think of North Dakota and watermelons, but we raised some nice ones in 2006

Ronna picking some
fresh vine-ripened tomatoes and cucumbers for the evening meal

You don't really
think of North Dakota and yellow roses either, but these came from the rock
garden...the melon weighed over 20 pounds and was vine-ripened delicious

Time to make some
raspberry freezer jam or can some sauce which is great on ice cream

Still
getting strawberries in October when the apples were getting ripe

Fireside apples on
the left and the yellow delicious on the right which are about baseball size

These are
unbelievably good made from real melted Kraft caramels

This huge flowering crab in the
campground area is always loaded with blooms but usually only for about a
week